


Surely This is Somewhere

by mammothluv



Category: Grey's Anatomy
Genre: Female Character of Color, Female Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-13
Updated: 2010-01-13
Packaged: 2017-10-06 06:01:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/50449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mammothluv/pseuds/mammothluv
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set directly after 5.13.  Cristina sits with Meredith.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Surely This is Somewhere

**Author's Note:**

> Grey's Anatomy belongs to Shonda Rhimes and ABC. I'm not making any profit and no copyright infringement is intended.

They don't talk after their first exchange. They sit in Derek's car and Meredith cries. Cristina fiddles with the radio, not because she cares what they're listening to, but because it gives her something to do. She knows Meredith won't mind.

Meredith doesn't tell Cristina what it was like to watch William Dunn die. She doesn't have to. Derek came to her apartment in the middle of the night because Meredith won't stop crying. That tells Cristina enough. Derek doesn't understand yet that sometimes you don't stop Meredith from crying.

Cristina flips through the stations for the second time and Meredith cries. Derek remains on the bench outside her apartment, still and patient. More than the engagement ring, this convinces Cristina he's trying.

Cristina wants to say she knows what it's like to watch someone die. She wants to tell Meredith about her father, the crash, the blood on her hands, the emptiness that followed. Most of all, Cristina wants to tell Meredith how she felt when Meredith drowned. She wants to apologize for walking away because, when she thought Meredith was dying, the emptiness she'd felt since her father's death expanded until she couldn't find her way out of it. She wants to put words to the desperation she felt when she returned to see Meredith lying lifeless on the stretcher. That desperation left her shouting at Bailey and the rest of the doctors to try again. She wants to say all of that. But, they don't talk. Cristina turns the volume on the radio down and then up again.

Drowning in the bay, her hand on the bomb, and now William Dunn. Cristina knows they're just outward manifestations of what Meredith fights every day. That's why Sadie and her stupid nicknames grate on Cristina. Sadie didn't watch Meredith die, Cristina did. It's also why Cristina didn't approve of the one hundredth reunion with McDreamy. He sees Meredith's pain but he thinks it's something that can be fixed. Derek still doesn't understand that Meredith's living at an 8. He doesn't understand that Meredith's pain is unbearable but she bears it anyway. Cristina understands.

Sometime around Cristina's fifth trip through the stations, Meredith's sobbing turns to muffled sniffles. Leaning across Meredith, Cristina opens the glove box hoping for tissues. She finds a few crumpled napkins and hands them to Meredith who wipes her eyes and then blows her nose loudly.

It doesn't matter that Meredith barely knew William Dunn, that he wasn't her father, that he wasn't her person, that he really wasn't anything to Meredith at all. It doesn't even matter that he was a serial killer. This is Meredith and, no matter how she tries to numb herself, she feels everything and everything hurts.

Unlike Derek, Cristina doesn't think she can fix it. Unlike Sadie, she doesn't think it's fun. And, unlike Meredith, she knows it doesn't go away with a couple therapy sessions and a reunion with McDreamy.

Meredith is her person and this is who she is. She reaches over and covers Meredith's hand with her own.


End file.
